Jessica #25 - Game of Pursuit

Jessica can't decide. Should the princess go after the knight in shining white overalls or wait for him to show up on horseback?

After the knight-in-shining-white-overalls incident, I tried to figure out in which office Slick Rick worked, so I could thank him again for rescuing me and my flat tire from that deserted nighttime parking lot.

My intention was not to figure out a way to be so dazzlingly nice that he'd have no choice but to reassess his horrible first impression of me and beg me to accompany him on a date.

I just wanted to thank him.

To my chagrin, no one seemed to know his identity, and then I got distracted by the holidays, and then Ellen gave a guy she works with my phone number...

Ellen's guy called after Yom Kippur. We spoke. He asked me out for dinner, and all was well in the world.

It had been a while since I went on a blind date. It took all my strength to keep from bursting out laughing at the moment of meeting: those three milliseconds when we first see each other and try really hard not to let our first impression -- "Oh, he's cute!" or "Uh-oh. He's not so cute." -- register on our faces.

It took all my strength to not laugh at the moment of meeting.

I was impressed that he took me to a fancy shmancy restaurant in Scottsdale named after some explorer rather than the usual let's-see-if-we-click-before-I-spend-money meeting at Coffee Plantation.

He had his cellphone, a Star-Tac, with him. Before we ordered our drinks, it rang -- apparently some friend asking about his plans that night. Then they started to talk about a football game, then about a mutual friend of theirs. Meanwhile, I am sitting there trying to be understanding.

I tried to give him the benefit of the doubt. I recalled Rina telling me that Israelis answer their phones in the middle of movies. So I figured this guy's not so bad. Or maybe his friend is going through some sort of serious emotional trauma and he needs to be supportive.

--"Sorry, Jessica," he said, smiling warmly.

We ordered our drinks.

Ring! He answers again, starts babbling with a bunch of wazzup's, oblivious to my presence, and from what I could determine from his end of the conversation, there was nothing of tremendous importance being discussed.

Now I begin to stare. He gets off and smiles again.

-- "So, tell me how you came to Phoenix," he says, all easy confidence. "Ellen said you moved here for a job."

Ring!

-- "If you answer that," I said loudly, "I am leaving."

If you answer that, I am leaving.

He didn't answer the phone and for the rest of the night, the conversation centered around shirt and towel monograms.

We didn't go out again.

Which brings me to The Pursuit. I was now totally determined to hunt down Slick Rick, the last known gentleman in the Industrialized West.

"So what exactly is your game plan?" Alison asked when I told her I'd come up empty in gathering clues about Rick.

"Well, at this point, I, uh... well, I..." I shrugged.

"Jess, you're pathetic."

"Okay, but we already knew that."

"It's not possible that you really can't find him."

"Well..." I stammered.

In point of fact, I did know which office was his. And where his parking space was. And at roughly what time he ate lunch, half the time at his desk, half the time walking the few blocks downtown. And that he grew up here, in Glendale. That he is very close with his brother, who worked for a consulting firm nearby. And that he is much beloved by his secretary. It was not for nothing that I became a reporter, even if I had ended up digging up information on color trends rather than city hall corruption.

"You're just chicken," Alison said, rolling her eyes. "You're going to skulk around and find out everything you can about him to the point that you could be accused of stalking -- and then you'll never get the guts to ask the guy out anyway."

Well, at least Alison knows me well.

"He doesn't want me to ask him out!" I said, adding in a voice I hoped was terribly serious: "Besides, I think a woman should be pursued, not the pursuer."

Do women ever take into consideration how hard it is for guys to approach us?

I wondered if we women ever took into consideration how hard it is for guys to ask us out, to approach us, to make the first call. We take it for granted and forget how brave they have to be -- and then complain if they come off as arrogant.

Another few days passed. Each sighting of his Honda Accord sitting in its space reminded me of what a timorous wimp I am.

Then, when I drove in this morning, I noticed that he'd washed it after the recent storms.

-- I am noticing when he washes his car, I thought. Alison is right. I am pathetic. And juvenile.

That's it, I resolved. I am going to go into his office at 10:30 to ask him if I can take him to lunch.

I marched decisively upstairs, feeling terrifically confident and take-charge. Uber-secretary came in and dropped a package on my desk, snapping her gum.

"Someone dropped this off a few days ago. Sorry I forgot to bring it in."

It was a small book on basic car care, with a bookmark on the chapter on changing tires. A business card and post-it were clipped on top.

This is a gesture of friendship.
I am not asking you out.
Unless you want me to.
Rick

The opinions expressed in the comment section are the personal views of the commenters. Comments are moderated, so please keep it civil.

Visitor Comments: 4

(4)
Leo,
November 8, 2000 12:00 AM

WOW

Can this lady write or can she write!! Wow, this is better then watching some prime time TV show. Ally can never match up with our Jessica. Now I just hope I will not get too adicted to this and that Jessica (or whatever her real name is) will finally start a family and we can read some wonderfull family stories.
Can hardly wait!

(3)
Anonymous,
November 6, 2000 12:00 AM

Are you me?

I loved your story, especially about the cell-phone. That happened to me but I didnt have the guts to snap at the guy. Next time (if it happens), I think I will leave the date, I have been on so many discouraging dates, it's not worth putting myself through torture. I hope we both find our knight in shining armour.

(2)
Anonymous,
November 4, 2000 12:00 AM

Great little story

What a great little story. Wonder if it was true. Brightened up my morning that the fellow actually got in touch with her. My days of such romantic encounters have come and gone (actually, I don't think too many came) So, thanks for letting me share these ones.

(1)
Terri Cohen,
November 4, 2000 12:00 AM

Oooooh, I love it!

I'm so excited for you --- I don't want to wait another week to see what happened when you "marched upstairs"! Don't keep us in suspense too long ....

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I've been striving to get more into spirituality. But it seems that every time I make some progress, I find myself slipping right back to where I started. I'm getting discouraged and feel like a failure. Can you help?

The Aish Rabbi Replies:

Spiritual slumps are a natural part of spiritual growth. There is a cycle that people go through when at times they feel closer to God and at times more distant. In the words of the Kabbalists, it is "two steps forward and one step back." So although you feel you are slipping, know that this is a natural process. The main thing is to look at your overall progress (over months or years) and be able to see how far you've come!

This is actually God's ingenious way of motivating us further. The sages compare this to teaching a baby how to walk. When the parent is holding on, the baby shrieks with delight and is under the illusion that he knows how to walk. Yet suddenly, when the parent lets go, the child panics, wobbles and may even fall.

At such times when we feel spiritually "down," that is often because God is letting go, giving us the great gift of independence. In some ways, these are the times when we can actually grow the most. For if we can move ourselves just a little bit forward, we truly acquire a level of sanctity that is ours forever.

Here is a practical tool to help pull you out of the doldrums. The Sefer HaChinuch speaks about a great principle in spiritual growth: "The external awakens the internal." This means that although we may not experience immediate feelings of closeness to God, eventually, by continuing to conduct ourselves in such a manner, this physical behavior will have an impact on our spiritual selves and will help us succeed. (A similar idea is discussed by psychologists who say: "Smile and you will feel happy.")

That is the power of Torah commandments. Even if we may not feel like giving charity or praying at this particular moment, by having a "mitzvah" obligation to do so, we are in a framework to become inspired. At that point we can infuse that act of charity or prayer with all the meaning and lift it can provide. But if we'd wait until being inspired, we might be waiting a very long time.

May the Almighty bless you with the clarity to see your progress, and may you do so with joy.

In 1940, a boatload 1,600 Jewish immigrants fleeing Hitler's ovens was denied entry into the port of Haifa; the British deported them to the island of Mauritius. At the time, the British had acceded to Arab demands and restricted Jewish immigration into Palestine. The urgent plight of European Jewry generated an "illegal" immigration movement, but the British were vigilant in denying entry. Some ships, such as the Struma, sunk and their hundreds of passengers killed.

If you seize too much, you are left with nothing. If you take less, you may retain it (Rosh Hashanah 4b).

Sometimes our appetites are insatiable; more accurately, we act as though they were insatiable. The Midrash states that a person may never be satisfied. "If he has one hundred, he wants two hundred. If he gets two hundred, he wants four hundred" (Koheles Rabbah 1:34). How often have we seen people whose insatiable desire for material wealth resulted in their losing everything, much like the gambler whose constant urge to win results in total loss.

People's bodies are finite, and their actual needs are limited. The endless pursuit for more wealth than they can use is nothing more than an elusive belief that they can live forever (Psalms 49:10).

The one part of us which is indeed infinite is our neshamah (soul), which, being of Divine origin, can crave and achieve infinity and eternity, and such craving is characteristic of spiritual growth.

How strange that we tend to give the body much more than it can possibly handle, and the neshamah so much less than it needs!